The Corinthian is a 57-story apartment building that was

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

's largest apartment building when it opened in 1988.

Background

The building is located on the former site of the East Side Airline Terminal, a passenger terminal that provided bus service to

LaGuardia LaGuardia Airport is a civil airport in East Elmhurst, Queens, New York City. Covering , the facility was established in 1929 and began operating as a public airport in 1939. It is named after former New York City mayor Fiorello La Guardia. ...

and

JFK John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...

airports via the adjacent

Queens–Midtown Tunnel The Queens–Midtown Tunnel (also sometimes called the Midtown Tunnel) is a vehicular tunnel under the East River in New York City, connecting the boroughs of Manhattan and Queens. The tunnel consists of a pair of tubes, each carrying two ...

. The terminal closed in 1984 and was auctioned off by the

Metropolitan Transportation Authority The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is a public benefit corporation responsible for public transportation in the New York City metropolitan area of the U.S. state of New York. The MTA is the largest public transit authority in th ...

the following year. Initially expected to sell for $50 million, a bidding war drove up the price of the real estate to $90.6 million; the site was attractive to developers as it was already zoned to permit high-density use and there would be no occupants to relocate after the terminal's remaining leases expired in 1986. The winning bidder was a joint venture consisting of Bernard Spitzer,

Peter L. Malkin Peter L. Malkin (born January 14, 1934) is an American real estate investor and chairman emeritus of Empire State Realty Trust and Malkin Holdings. Biography Born to a American Jews, Jewish family,

Design

The development team had originally planned to tear down the entire East Side Airline Terminal, but after discovering that it was very well constructed they decided to save a significant portion of the terminal and incorporate it as offices in the base of the structure, adding columns to support the new residential tower above. The remaining 35 percent of the terminal along First Avenue was demolished to create a landscaped plaza, fountain, and

porte-cochère A porte-cochère (; , late 17th century, literally 'coach gateway'; plural: porte-cochères, portes-cochères) is a doorway to a building or courtyard, "often very grand," through which vehicles can enter from the street or a covered porch-like ...

The Corinthian was designed by

Der Scutt Der Scutt (October 17, 1934 – March 14, 2010) was an American architect and designer of a number of major and notable buildings throughout New York City and the United States. Scutt worked on Trump Tower next to the Tiffany & Co. fla ...

, design architect, and John Schimenti., pp. 219-220. Its fluted towers with

bay windows A bay window is a window space projecting outward from the main walls of a building and forming a bay in a room. Types Bay window is a generic term for all protruding window constructions, regardless of whether they are curved or angular, or r ...

are unusual compared to the traditional boxy shape of buildings in the city, and it bears a resemblance to

Marina City Marina City is a mixed-use residential-commercial building complex in Chicago, Illinois, United States, North America, designed by architect Bertrand Goldberg. The multi-building complex opened between 1963 and 1967 and occupies almost an entir ...

and

Lake Point Tower Lake Point Tower is a residential skyscraper located on a promontory of the Lake Michigan waterfront in Chicago, just north of the Chicago River at 505 North Lake Shore Drive. Completed in 1968, it is in the Streeterville neighborhood on the N ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. According to Bernard Spitzer, the building was named the Corinthian because "we think we have the contemporary version of the

Corinthian column The Corinthian order (Greek: Κορινθιακός ρυθμός, Latin: ''Ordo Corinthius'') is the last developed of the three principal classical orders of Ancient Greek architecture and Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric order ...

, the most lavish of the Greek columns." The semicircular windows provide a 180-degree view from every apartment. Many of the apartments include private balconies, which are located between the fluted towers. At it is the largest project of Bernard Spitzer. It occupies a full city block between First Avenue and Tunnel Entrance Street and between East 37th and 38th Streets, and overlooks the

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

entrance to the Queens–Midtown Tunnel and

St. Vartan Park St. Vartan Park is a public park in the Murray Hill, Manhattan, Murray Hill neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Located on the block bounded by First Avenue (Manhattan), First Avenue, Second Avenue (Manhattan), Second Avenue, and 35th and ...

. It has 863 apartments, of commercial space on the first through third floors, a garage and setback roof deck. At the residential entrance to the building facing First Avenue is a cascading, semicircular waterfall fountain and a high

Aristides Demetrios Aristides Burton Demetrios (born 1932) is an American sculptor. Life Aristides Burton Demetrios, also known as "Aris," was born in 1932 and raised in Massachusetts, where he lived during childhood in Gloucester. His father George Demetrios was a ...

bronze sculpture, "Peirene" named after the Fountain of Peirene in

Corinth Corinth ( ; el, Κόρινθος, Kórinthos, ) is the successor to an ancient city, and is a former municipality in Corinthia, Peloponnese, which is located in south-central Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform, it has been part o ...

. Its lobby is long and high and includes a high bronze sculpture by Bill Barrett, "Step for Two" and a high wood relief by John A. Kapel, "Totem."

History

The Spitzer family sold off the building's parking garage in 2009 for $10.3 million and the office condominiums in 2011 for $31 million. The office units were later renovated to attract more high-end medical practices given its proximity to

NYU Langone Medical Center NYU Langone Health is an academic medical center located in New York City, New York, United States. The health system consists of NYU Grossman School of Medicine and NYU Long Island School of Medicine, both part of New York University (NYU), and m ...

. In 2013, Gaia Real Estate purchased the 50th floor of the building for $14.6 million from

Pfizer Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered on 42nd Street in Manhattan, New York City. The company was established in 1849 in New York by two German entrepreneurs, Charles Pfizer ...

, which had bought the floor before the building opened and used the layout consisting of 21 bedrooms and 25 bathrooms as a corporate executive suite for its nearby headquarters at Second Avenue and 42nd Street. The 50th floor was subsequently renovated and divided into separate apartments. A year later, Gaia bought 144 more units in The Corinthian for $147 million, which were originally owned by the Spitzer family and had been rented out. These apartments were remarketed as The Corinthian Collection and sold in their original layout or as renovated units designed by Andres Escobar.

References

;Notes

External links

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Residential buildings completed in 1988 Apartment buildings in New York City Residential skyscrapers in Manhattan Murray Hill, Manhattan 1988 establishments in New York City {{Manhattan-struct-stub